Irish involvement in NASAs missions to the moon are not always well known or publicised. While it might be hard to imagine, the first Irish experiment in space was run by DIAS scientists in 1972 on Apollo 16.

The experiment consisted of a small detector in the form of a cellulose stack carried in the lunar module. The detector was exposed to the surface of the moon before being returned to Earth for analysis. The team were investigating cosmic rays, high energy charged particles from outside our solar system.

Leading on from this, DIAS scientists conducted the Ultra Heavy Cosmic Ray experiment, chosen by NASA in 1976, which was launched on the space shuttle in 1984.

The Astronomy and Astrophysics section, like many around the world, have been enthralled by the recent Artemis II mission. Researchers Dr. Shane Maloney and Dr. Laura Hayes are part of the Solar Physics and Space Weather group, and were excited the see the Artemis II image of the solar eclipse.

Both Shane and Laura are involved with SunPy – a community-developed free and open-source software package for solar physics. They have used the Artemis II image above because it is particularly good for comparing to other solar data because the limb of the moon is clearly visible, and there are stars and planets in the image we can use as references. These features will allowed them to determine exactly where the image was pointing and the angle of the camera.

If you are interested in learning more about their process and details of the SunPy project, they have a new post on their method available on the SunPy website here.